Technology for nonviolent struggle

Occasionally, though, there is opposition by scientists to military research. The most prominent case concerned the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), otherwise known as “star wars,” promoted by the US government. SDI was announced in 1983 during a massive mobilisation of the peace movement, and was clearly an attempt to undermine opposition to US government and military agendas. Thousands of scientists, seeing SDI as a continuation of the arms race, refused to seek or accept funding for SDI projects.[18]

However, this was an exceptional case, and even so there were plenty of scientists who were quite willing to take money for SDI, often with the rationalisation that they would use the money for their own research purposes. Critics saw SDI as both technically infeasible and militarily provocative. Many of those who signed the pledge against receiving SDI funding were not opposed to military funding for research in areas not related to SDI; indeed, many were seeking or in receipt of military funding.

As noted, SDI was an exception, linked to the strong antinuclear popular sentiment at the time. In most cases, there is no attempt at a boycott, and only a minority of scientists refuse military largesse on an individual level. For example, the cream of western physicists joined the Manhattan Project during World War II to produce the first nuclear weapons — of course with the honourable motivation of defeating an evil enemy — and there has been no shortage of scientists to produce hydrogen bombs, antipersonnel weapons and instruments of torture. When the Nazis took power in Germany in the 1930s, there was very little political resistance from the German physics community even though top scientists were dismissed and pressured to emigrate.[19]

Groups that might challenge military priorities in a fundamental fashion, such as peace movements, some churches, some trade unions and some political movements, seldom have the resources to fund scientific research, much less large-scale technological development. The technically trained labour force is mainly available to those groups that can afford to pay for it. The military is in an excellent position to do so. Even when scientists and engineers are working for industry and universities, or are unemployed, they provide a reserve labour force of experts of potential value for military purposes.[20]

Belief systems

Technology is shaped in various ways by systems of belief, or ideology to use another expression. At a basic level, it is necessary for a considerable number of people to believe in their society’s superiority in order to justify killing members of other societies, either in defending against attack or in launching one. Underlying the existence of the military is the assumption that it is legitimate to use technology to defend a society by force, including these days mass killing of enemy soldiers and civilians. Technology is a means to achieve a widely shared aim.

Belief systems do not arise out of thin air. Education systems, cultural traditions, enforcement of ideological orthodoxy and a host of other mechanisms are involved. How beliefs influence technological development, and vice versa, is often hard to figure out. This topic is far too big to deal with fully here, so a few examples will have to suffice.

In the 1920s, most aeroplanes were made of wood but fully metal construction was heavily researched. The switch to metal aeroplanes occurred before there was much evidence of their superiority, arguably because of beliefs about science and progress. Metal symbolised both science and progress, hence far more effort was expended developing and justifying metal aeroplanes than improving wooden ones.[21]

During the Vietnam war, US planners conceptualised the war in terms of science, technology, bureaucracy and management. These were all areas in which the US was superior, hence defeat was unthinkable. The conceptualisation of the war as technological led to the deployment of sophisticated weapons, contributed to the enormous human and environmental impact of the war (two million Vietnamese deaths), and helped obscure the real reasons for US defeat.[22]

In the case of the Strategic Defense Initiative, there were massive military funding influences on scientific research, but just as important were ideological factors. The massive funding boom for star wars helped to draw corporations into service to the US military and to weaken opposition to US military policy, especially by promoting the idea that this was a “defence” system. Thus, although star wars never came close to achieving its technological ambitions, it “worked” in both economic and political senses.[23] On a wider scale, it can be argued that the US Cold War vision of global power on the basis of automated, centralised control both shaped the development of computers and was sustained by both the technology and symbolism of computers.[24]